Phryne

"What do you plan on doing to me?" I asked Pots who simply leered at me with a smirk.

"What would her majesty like me to do with her?" His breath was just as foul as his insinuation and I couldn't help but wrinkle my nose at him as he spoke.

"Her majesty would like you to tell her why you are untying her and where you plan to take her."

"Well there's lots of places I'd like to take her, if you get my drift." I sighed.

"Of course I 'get your drift' you buffoon. You're as witty and subtle as rock to the head." His brow contorted as he tried to reply but he seemed to be having trouble coming up with words that would do the trick.

"The boss man wants to see you miss." Henry stepped down the stairs and gently pushed Pots aside. "I'll take over, Gates."

"But-" Pots was quick to protest but Henry clearly held rank here.

"No. I've a handle on this. Get back to the boat, they need help hauling in the catch of the day." I knew I smelled fish. Pots grumbled the whole way but did as he was told. As his footsteps faded away into silence Henry smiled softly at me. "Sorry, miss. I'm going to clean you up a bit before you go meet the boss man."

"Who is he, Henry?" I asked. Henry didn't answer, instead wiping the grime away from my hands.

"He doesn't want me to say, miss. He wants to know if you recognize him, and giving you clues right off gives you time to think on it, you see." I frowned. I was too tired and sore (and starving – what I wouldn't give for a dish of Mr. Butlers gratin right now!) to decide whether or not that made sense or was just odd.

Henry had cleaned me up. Well enough, anyway. My hands were still bound but my feet were not and Henry led me up the stairs. To climb a set of stairs! I thought to myself in a way that was surprisingly not sarcastic. The joy of something as simple as climbing the stairs. I stepped out of the pit of hell that was the basement I had been stored in and into the light.

That's when I saw him.

"Miss Fisher. Perhaps you don't recall. I'm-"

"Jimmy Thompson." He looked pleased I remembered him. Jimmy ran his fingers through his hair and nodded.

"Yes. I would like to apologize."

"Let me go and we can let bygones be bygones." I suggested quickly. He laughed. Bastard.

"Very amusing Miss Fisher. I would like it if this situation were that easy, but as it is, that is not possible." He took a breath and a drink of something that, while I couldn't tell precisely what it was, I was certain it was alcohol of some sort. "I would like to apologize because at the end of the day, this has little to do with you. Well, no. That's not true. But it has far less to do with you than it does your lover." Jack. Dear God, this was an attempt to get at Jack.

"He's not my lover." Even I knew that protest – while true – was weak. Jimmy laughed.

"Perhaps. But he loves you. And now you've disappeared. Just like my Emily disappeared. And when I felt hopeless, that was when Jack Robinson took away even the small comforts I had left. So I shall do the same." My blood chilled.

"What are you talking about?"

"You have disappeared. He has finally become truly and utterly hopeless. The men he works with are constantly suggesting that you haven't been taken, you've run off with another man. He is in my shoes. Perhaps now, he will understand what he did to me."

"The difference of course being that Emily did run off, whereas you kidnapped me."

"Shut it, whore. You would have left him for another man eventually, I just couldn't wait any longer." He said the words with such certainty it made me shiver. Is that who I was? Someone so callous, so unfaithful that it was unimaginable that I had found true love and would be able to stay with it. Perhaps before. Before Jack. But now, after Jack, everything had changed. "It doesn't matter. The feeling is the same. Doubting, unsure, wanting to believe in your love, that she loves you too, but hopeless, seed of doubt shifting through you, growing."

"I haven't run off." I snapped at him. "And Jack will find out."

"I'm counting on it. And when he does, he will also find out that you have been ruined for him." I snorted with laughter.

"Don't bother. I've been ruined more times you can count." Jimmy frowned.

"I am aware. But then you met him. Then he fell in love with you. Then you began to have feelings for you. And now all he can think about is him and you, forever. No one else. There's no one else for him, and he wants to be the only one for you. Now that things have changed, who becomes involved with your loins has changed. It will break him. Even when he takes you back, he won't be able to stop thinking about it. Years from now, he won't be able to forget it. And it will tear you two apart. And then, perhaps then, you will understand my heartbreak."

"Jimmy!" I protested. "Why are you doing this? Emily left you and broke your heart and that is horribly sad and I feel for you, but that isn't Jack nor my fault! When you thought she'd been kidnapped or killed we did our best to find her. But all the evidence pointed to a different story and when we had proof of that we had no choice but to accept it! That wasn't our fault! So why are you trying to make us pay?" He didn't answer; he just glowered at me.

"You don't understand."

"Jimmy, please, don't do this."

"It's too late, Miss Fisher. I'm too far in."

"It's never too late, Jimmy. I won't say a thing. Let me go now and I won't press charges!"

"That isn't what I mean. It's too late for me, Miss Fisher. I'm too far gone." He stepped towards me. "He will come for you soon, Miss Fisher. He's already figured out that it wasn't Rosie, it's only a matter of time before he stumbles upon you. And if he doesn't, I'll send him a little clue. When it happens, I will come for you, and I will set the stage for the dear inspector." He didn't mean, he couldn't mean… "As I said, Miss Fisher. I would like to apologize. I am going to do something rather horrible to you. I thought I should be the one to tell you myself. Anyway, Henry, take her back downstairs." Henry slunk forward, refusing to meet my eyes. I was returned unceremoniously to my chamber of horribleness and I noticed that Henry was tearing up.

"Just let me go, Henry." I pleaded softly. I could yet escape the fate Jimmy had lined up for me. I knew Henry pitied me. Perhaps he could be persuaded to protect me.

"I can't, miss."

"Why not?"

"He saved my life. Three times, actually. Twice in the war and again not two months ago. Risked his own life to push me out of the way of a speeding car. I owe him my life three times over."

"He's going to defile me." I protested. "What kind of man repays a debt with such a vile act?"

"What kind of man saves another's life with the intent to collect on that debt? It is that type of man who requires such appalling payment. But as a man of honor, I must repay my debt."

"A man of honor would not allow this to happen to a lady."

"You are many things, Miss Fisher. But surely a lady is not one of them." If I could I would have slapped him. "He will not kill anyone, and it is not as though you are a virgin, no?"

"And that makes this okay?"

"I'm sorry Miss Fisher. It must be this way."

"No!" I called out after him as he all but fled the room. "No it doesn't! You fool! Let me go!"

But of course, this isn't a storybook. So he didn't.

Author's Note: Thoughts? Please review!